Has anyone reconfigured existing bedrooms?

[Whereverilaymycat]

We have three bedrooms. Two generous doubles and a tiny box room. Ideally we are hoping to do a loft conversion which will give another double and allow the box room to be an office.
But funds may make this an out of reach dream and to move would likely result in some compromises (plus I love my house).
So I wondered how easy it would be to chop up the box room and one double into two modest doubles. The main issue I can see is the window in one room.
Had anyone done this? Did it work out?
Any stories or pearls of wisdom would be much appreciated. Thank you!

The episode of love it or List it that was on this week did this.
They staggered the wall because of the window issue so put the beds into alcoves.
Assuming it's a stud wall rather than load bearing?

Yes, we did exactly this about a year ago and it has been brilliant. Our house is old, and the walls were half brick, half lathe and plaster so it was very messy. We put up a new stud wall and did the whole job ourselves. The most fiddly bits were moving a radiator, power sockets and light switches. Also you might want to move ceiling lights as they won't be central once the joining wall has moved. It was definitely worth doing as our youngest now has a decent sized bedroom instead of a box room.

Thank you everyone! I have that episode recorded so I’ll take a look. Not sure about load bearing, I’ll take that into consideration.
Glad to hear it paid off. If push came to shove we could try and make the box room work as the children get older, but to get them a desk etc and in terms of fairness, I would like to do something if I can.

Yes definitely a whole different job if the wall is load bearing. Usually, load bearing walls run in the same direction as the floorboards above. This is because the joists beneath the floorboards will sit on the load bearing walls. Goes without saying you need this confirmed by a surveyor or builder though.

We did, or rather dh did it - one large double and one very small single, turned them into one smaller double and one much better sized single. No issue with windows, though, and a plasterboard wall.

Why on earth the builders didn’t do that in the first place we’ve often wondered.

I did it (or rather a crack team of builders did)

A huge high ceiling bedroom with two windows

Spilt straight down the middle and a hall way creates so each have own entrance door and a large window.
It wasn’t cheap as also had built in furniture to maximise space, redecorated and new carpets and of course changed the electrics so the points were convenient in both rooms.

£12k all in if I remember correctly.

4 years later it still gives me huge pleasure to see how successful it was

It may have been more actually can’t remember

But worth every single penny

One of my mums neighbours did something different. Typical 30s semi, two equal doubles, tiny box room, bathroom and separate loo.

They knocked the loo and bathroom into one and used the floor space that housed the doors to both those spaces for additional roomspace. Made that a bedroom and put the bathroom in the old box room, which fit a bath, loo and basin fine.

The bathroom space is perfectly adequate and the bedrooms are now better spaced.

The layout of the house did also mean that they could have changed the wall between the front bedroom and box room and pinched a wee bit of the landing to get better rooms.